Pac Man is such an oddity of a character, its hard for me sometimes to decided if I fully want him in the new Smash Bros or not. He has a lot going for him that I like, and his chances are quite high this time around, but there are a few cons to him as well, though those might be more personal then objective.
Namco seems to have such a good history with nintendo and the fact they are helping out with the creation of Smash Bros and helping Sakurai put in such big names like Megaman and Sonic, really makes me feel they might want to get in on this action (I dont think anyone could deny that a battle between Capcom, Sega, Nintendo and Namco wouldn't be one of the coolest match ups to have available). Definitly its not 100% guaranteed, but I think Sakurai would see the potential there.
A lot of people would bring up his quote, mentioning that Namco would not get any special consideration for helping with smash bros. But in reality I don't think this is Sakurai saying "Namco is not allowed to have a character in our game". It sound more like he wants to avoid people thinking Namco would take advantage of the situation and saying "Since we are helping you guys build such a huge game, we want to be able to put one of our characters in your game." If Namco sat down with Sakurai and talked about the idea of of how putting their main iconic character Pac-Man in the game would benefit both parties, I'm sure an agreement could be made.
That being said I understand some of the problems with Pac-man for Sakurai. Unlike Megaman and Sonic, who I think everyone and their dog wanted in smash bros, Pacman is a little less popular and certainly has a group of haters on his case. I could understand Sakurai being a little worried about this. As well, I am not so certain Sakurai would want to use his newest design from Pacman and the Ghostly Adventures, as it would be more of an advertisement for the T.V show, rather then the pac man games (I have honestly never seen the show and dont know if it was inspired by the Games or if the game was inspired by the show, so you'll have to excuse me if im talking out my ass on this point.)
Frankly I am not a huge fan of the T.V shows version of pacman. Those small pupils, the teeth in his mouth. Something about the design seems really off to me (Personal opinion, so certainly feel free to ignore this part of my post if you disagree.)
I would much rather see this version of him (not fighting in a big weird robot just this look) if he was going to be in the game.
It isn't too much different from his TV show look, but the small tweaks and facial expressions that came from this game I actually enjoyed. Seeing him spin around and say "Aaaaaalrighty" really made him a fun quirky character to me. (Ditch the robot for me if you come to Smash alright Paccy.)
He has a decent chance of making it in this game, despte whether or not some really want him, so I'de say I support him for the most part.